TweakNow PowerPack 2012 – A Free Menu-Driven Windows Tweaking Application

Geeks know exactly how, and where, to tweak a Windows operating system – without necessarily running a dedicated tweaking application. Average users on the other hand, generally lack the background and experience, to venture into the dark and hidden spaces of a Windows environment.

But, that doesn’t mean an average user can’t tweak just like a pro. Luckily, there are more than a few free tweaking apps available that can help average users apply the most common system tweaks.

In past reviews of tweaking applications, more than a few readers have mentioned TweakNow PowerPack as their go-to tweaking application. So, I thought I’d take a very quick peek at TweakNow PowerPack’s capabilities.

As with most  tweaking applications, TweakNow PowerPack is menu-driven – making it easy to accomplish system changes without the drudgery of having to go through menu after menu, or manually editing the Registry.

TweakNow PowerPack has a clean, easy to understand interface that provides access to over 100 system settings, some of which are hidden, and others that are just hard to find. The interface is organized for easy navigation, so, I can see no reason why a careful average user should have any problem tweaking their system with TweakNow PowerPack.

Fast facts:

Fully-integrated suite of utilities that let you fine-tune every aspect of your computer’s operating system and Web browser.

Access to more than 100 hidden Windows settings.

Quick Optimizer.

Windows Cleaner includes – Disk Cleaner, Disk Usage Analyzer, Registry Defragmenter, Registry Cleaner, Secure Delete, Startup Manager, Tracks Cleaner and an Uninstaller.

Virtual Desktop module lets you run as many as four custom-designed desktop configurations simultaneously.

Detailed information on your motherboard, processor, video card, memory, hard disk and network.

Even more tweaks to suit your fancy.

The interface is organized for easy navigation, so, I can see no reason why a careful average user should have any problem tweaking their system with Quick Optimizer.

The following screen captures illustrate just a few of the large feature set built into this free application.

Quick Optimizer:

Windows Secret:

Miscellaneous Tools:

System requirements: Windows 8, 7, Vista, XP.

Download at:  Author’s site.

AbiWord 2.8.1 – The Best Free Multilingual Word Processor?

AbiWord is arguably one of the best light word processing applications at any price. But FREE, makes installing this superb application a “no brainer”.

I recently downloaded and installed the Beta version of MS Office 2010 for testing, and I must admit, I’m blown away. Microsoft seems to be hitting all the right notes lately with the release of a bevy of updated products, including Windows 7.

But, not many of us need the power and the amazing functionality of Microsoft Word – or, lets face it, the major expense. A free word processor, like AbiWord, will meet the every day needs of the majority of users.

AbiWord, which is an open source application, has been designed to integrate perfectly with the operating system it runs on, and there are many, including Windows, Linux, Mac OS X (PowerPC).

There’s no need to worry about document compatibility issues with AbiWord since it can read, and write, all industry standard document types, including Microsoft Word, WordPerfect, Office Open XML (MS Word 2007), Rich Text Format (RTF), HTML web pages, and many more.

If you’ve used MS Word in the past, you’ll encounter no learning curve with AbiWord. It features a similar looking interface to Word, with it’s basic character formatting, paragraph alignment, spell checker, interactive rulers and tabs, styles, unlimited undo/redo, find and replace, and image support.

If you’re running on an older system with limited resources, you’ll be glad to know that this application has a very small resource footprint, and that allows full functionality on systems that are not considered “State of the Art”, by today’s standards.

I find AbiWord with its surprising amount of features and simple straightforward interface, to be the appropriate word processor I need running in the background, while I’m on the Internet on one of my older systems. Its small memory footprint, as opposed to memory hogging Microsoft Word, is ideal. In fact, portable AbiWord is my word processor of choice for my portable office on my USB key.

The following graphic shows a previous review of AbiWord written on this application.

Fast facts:

Multi Platform

Internationalized

Advanced document layout options

Tables, bullets, lists, images, footnotes, endnotes and styles

Available in most common, and many not-so-common languages

Spell checker

Dictionaries for over 30 languages

Supports right-to-left, left-to-right, and mixed-mode text

The above feature allows support for languages like Hebrew and Arabic

Mail Merge capabilities

Powerful collaboration capabilities – allowing multiple people to work on one document at the same time.

Integrated with a new online web service called AbiCollab.net, which lets you store documents online, allows easy document sharing with your friends, and performs format conversions on the fly.

System requirements: Most UNIX systems, Windows 95 and later, QNX Neutrino 6.2.  A Mac OS X native port is also available.

Download at: Download.com

If you enjoyed this article, why not subscribe to this Blog via RSS, or email? It’s easy; just click on this link and you’ll never miss another Tech Thoughts article.

Free, Simple and New User Friendly PC Utilities – Pristy Utilities 2009

Frequently, new and casual computer users get left behind when it comes to PC utility software.

Developers of this type of application are prone to designing tools that require more than just a passing knowledge of how computer operating systems really work.

For many users, particularly new or casual computer users, a simple set of tools that does not require the user to be geek inclined, are more appropriate than a suite of tools that does everything but clean the kitchen sink.

Pristy Utilities 2009 is a simple but nonetheless powerful set of tools for new and casual computer users that includes the following comparatively basic modules:

System Power Down Scheduler – A fully customizable scheduler that allows the user to schedule Power down, Reboot, Sleep, Log off, Locking the desktop, etc. Includes timer presets with custom options.

PC Detector – Displays essentially the same information as Windows Device Manager but in a manner that is more new user friendly.

Web Assistant – I found this module particularly appealing since it allows a quick one click approach to multi-tab web browsing with integrated search engines including Web Search, News, and Services. Additional functions include transmitting emails and files over the Internet.

Additional modules include:

System Memory Cleaner – There are better, and more functional, free standalone memory utilities but in a pinch this can do the job.

File Wipeout – A simple file eraser; nothing special here.

Desktop Clock – A floating clock applet that additionally provides, date and CPU speed stats.

Vista Booster – Allows the optimization of Vista settings, CPU L2 setup, boot defragmentation, and fonts repair and install.

Toolbar and Tray Agent – Gives instant access to all application modules.

System Requirements: Windows Vista, XP, 2000, 98, Me, NT

Download at: Download.com

For a more robust set of system utilities checkout “Glary Utilities – Perfect Collection of Free System Tools” on this site.

Pristy Utilities 2009 – Simple PC Tools

Very often new and casual computer users get left behind when it comes to PC utility software.

Developers of this type of applications are prone to designing tools that require more than just a passing knowledge of how computer operating systems really work.

For many users, a simple set of tools that does not require the user to be geek inclined are more appropriate than a suite of tools that does everything but clean the kitchen sink.

Pristy Utilities 2009 is a somewhat low end, but simple set of tools for new and casual computer users that includes the following fairly basic modules:

System Power Down scheduler – A fully customizable scheduler that allows the user to schedule Power down, Reboot, Sleep, Log off, Locking the desktop, etc. Includes timer presets with custom options.

PC Detector – Displays essentially the same information as Windows Device Manager but in a manner that is more new user friendly.

Web Assistant – I found this module particularly appealing since it allows a quick one click approach to multi-tab web browsing with integrated search engines including Web Search, News, and Services. Additional functions include transmitting emails and files over the Internet.

Additional modules include:

System Memory Cleaner – There are better, and more functional, free stand alone memory utilities but in a pinch this can do the job.

File Wipeout – An elementary file eraser; nothing special here.

Desktop Clock – A floating clock applet that additionally provides, date and CPU speed stats.

Vista Booster – Allows the optimization of Vista settings, CPU L2 setup, boot defrag, fonts repair and install.

Toolbar and Tray Agent – Gives instant access to all application modules.

System Requirements: Windows XP, 2000, 98, Me, NT

Download at: Download.com

For a more robust set of system utilities checkout “Glary Utilities – Perfect Collection of Free System Tools” on this site.

The Best Free Word Processor – AbiWord – Multilingual MS Word Alternative

A friend called me recently and wondered if he could “borrow” my copy of MS Word so that he could update a saved copy of his resume in Microsoft Word format. It seems he no longer had access to Word.

I pointed out to him that he could simple download any one of the many free alternatives to Word that are available for download; most of which “save” and “open” in Word’s .doc format. It surprised me to learn that he was unaware that there are free alternatives to Word, of which, AbiWord is arguably one of the best of these light word processing applications.

AbiWord has been designed to integrate perfectly with the operating system it runs on, and there are many, including Windows, Linux, Mac OS X (PowerPC), ReactOS, and BeOS. This great application has been written to take advantage of the functionality provided by the system it runs on, such as image loading, or printing capabilities.

AbiWord is no slouch when it comes to being able to read and write all industry standard document types, like OpenOffice, Microsoft Word, WordPerfect, Rich Text Format, HTML web pages, and many more.

There’s no learning curve involved with AbiWord since it features a similar looking interface to Word, with it’s basic character formatting, paragraph alignment, spell checker, interactive rulers and tabs, styles, unlimited undo/redo, find and replace, and image support.

AbiWord has a very small resource footprint, which allows full functionality on systems that are not considered “State of the Art”. For those users with underpowered systems (by modern standards), this alternative light word processors should prove to be ideal.

I find AbiWord with its surprising amount of features and simple straightforward interface, to be the appropriate word processor I need running in the background while I’m on the Internet. Its small memory footprint, as opposed to memory hogging Microsoft Word, is ideal for most of my day to day work. In fact, portable AbiWord is my word processor of choice for my portable office on my USB key.

As you can see from the picture below, this article was written on AbiWord.

Features:

Multi Platform

Internationalized

Advanced document layout options

Tables, bullets, lists, images, footnotes, endnotes and styles

Available in most common, and many not-so-common languages

Spell checker

Dictionaries for over 30 languages

Supports right-to-left, left-to-right, and mixed-mode text

The above feature allows support for languages like Hebrew and Arabic

Mail Merge capabilities

Download at: Download.com

Speedup Your Slow Computer – Free Solutions to System Slowdown

In computing, I find that there is nothing that aggravates me quite as much as a slow boot time, or a machine that continuously responds in a sluggish manner.

Unfortunately, it seems with a Windows machine it is inevitable that it will slow down over time. There are a ton of reasons for this, but the following causes are the most common.

In most cases, since a slow computer is generally suffering from more than one problem, you will probably find that you will have to resolve the issue using more than a single solution.

A Messy Registry

The longer you use Windows, the more disordered your registry can become, especially if you regularly install and uninstall software. Many applications, on being uninstalled, leave behind “orphan” registry entries. They don’t remove all traces of themselves; causing problems such as sluggish performance, system lockups, or a bloated registry that takes longer to load on startup.

The easiest way to clean your registry is to use a free registry cleaner, such as RegSeeker. With the click of a button, RegSeeker will scan your registry for these fragmented files, and safely remove them. As with all Registry cleaners, use caution and be sure to backup using the backup feature of the application.

Download at: Hoverdesk

Full Hard Drive

A full hard drive will not function efficiently. You require at least 2 – 3MB of free space for programs to run smoothly. If you lack this much free space, you should uninstall unused programs on your primary drive. A superior program to uninstall programs from your computer is Revo Uninstaller. This free program with its advanced and fast algorithm scans before, and after you uninstall an application.

After the program’s regular uninstaller runs, you can remove additional unnecessary files, folders and registry keys that are usually left over (those “orphaned” registry entries we talked about earlier), on your computer. This feature is a definite plus.

Download at: Revo Group

Not Enough Memory

It’s important to have enough memory on your computer to keep programs running smoothly. Current recommendations are that you have at least 512MB on your PC, although at this point, 1GB/2GB seems to be a safer bet. If you need to upgrade your RAM, check your local retail ads for sales. You can usually get a RAM upgrade at a great price.

Alternatively, you can run a free memory manager such as FreeRam XP Pro to free and optimize your computer’s RAM (Random Access Memory). The result should be an increase in system performance and productivity. The application automatically configures itself for ease of use, and also features advanced options and customizability. FreeRAM XP Pro has been designed to be easy to use yet highly customizable by computer novices and experts alike. I have been using this application for several years, and I am delighted with its performance.

Download at:  MajorGeeks

Too Many Start-Up Programs

When you boot your computer, there may be a large number of programs that start automatically. These programs impact your computer’s available processing capacity and memory usage, and can slow it down dramatically. In all probability, you don’t need all of these programs to automatically start when you boot your computer.

Autoruns is a free utility, which has the most comprehensive knowledge of auto-starting locations of any startup monitor, in my view, and shows you what programs are configured to run during system boot up or login, and the order Windows processes them.

These programs will include ones in your startup folder, Run, RunOnce, and other Registry keys. You can configure Autoruns to show additional locations, including Explorer shell extensions, toolbars, browser helper objects, Winlogon notifications, auto-start services, and more. Autoruns goes considerably beyond the MSConfig utility bundled with Windows.

Download at: Softonic

Turn off unnecessary services

If you are a typical computer user, then the fewer services your system runs the better. This issue is too comprehensive to discuss in this article but you can read my article on this Blog which will assist you in determining which services you can turn off in Windows XP Pro/Home, to improve performance and boot time.

Spyware and Malicious Programs

A common spyware complaint is; it slows down the operating system. As spyware accumulates on a computer, performance can grind to a dismal halt. Combating spyware starts with learning to recognize its presence and understanding its impact on system resources.

Recognizing when spyware is installed on a computer system and removing it promptly is the best method of protecting computers from catastrophic problems caused by spyware. There are many free applications available to help you recognize, control and remove spyware, adware, Trojans, and other malicious malware/programs that can infect and slowdown your system.

Here are some free applications that are reliable and I feel confident in recommending.

SpyBot Search and Destroy

AdAware

AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition

ThreatFire 3

Comodo Firewall Pro

Slow Computer? – Free Software Solutions!

There may be multiple reasons why your computer behaves badly and is no longer the speed demon it once was. The most common problems that have impact on a computer’s speed and behavior are listed here, with the appropriate free software solution.

In most cases, since a slow computer is generally suffering from more than one problem, you will probably find that you will have to resolve the issue using more than a single solution.

A Cluttered Registry

The longer you use Windows, the more cluttered your registry can become, especially if you regularly install and uninstall software. Many applications, on being uninstalled, leave behind “orphan” registry entries. They don’t remove all traces of themselves; causing problems such as sluggish performance, system lockups, or a bloated registry that takes longer to load on startup. The easiest way to clean your registry is to use a free registry cleaner, such as Regseeker. With the click of a button, Regseeker will scan your registry for these fragmented files, and safely remove them.

Download: Regseeker

Full Hard Drive

A full hard drive will not function efficiently. You require at least 2 – 3MB of free space for programs to run smoothly. If you lack this much free space, you should uninstall unused programs on your primary drive. A superior program to uninstall programs from your computer is Revo Uninstaller. This free program with its advanced and fast algorithm scans before, and after you uninstall an application.

After the program’s regular uninstaller runs, you can remove additional unnecessary files, folders and registry keys that are usually left over (those “orphaned” registry entries we talked about earlier), on your computer. This feature is a definite plus.

Download: Revouninstaller

Not Enough Memory

It’s important to have enough memory on your computer to keep programs running smoothly. Current recommendations are that you have at least 512MB on your PC, although at this point, 1GB seems to be a safer bet (2 GB if you are running Vista). If you need to upgrade your RAM, check your local retail ads for sales. You can usually get a RAM upgrade at a great price.

Alternatively, you can run a free memory manager such as FreeRam XP Pro to free and optimize your computer’s RAM (Random Access Memory). The result is an increase in system performance and productivity. The application automatically configures itself for ease of use and also features advanced options and customizability. FreeRAM XP Pro has been designed to be easy to use yet highly customizable by computer novices and experts alike. I have been using this application for several years, and I am delighted with its performance.

Download: FreeRAM XP Pro

Too Many Start-Up Programs

When you boot your computer, there may be a number of programs that start automatically. These programs impact your computer’s available processing capacity and memory usage, and can slow it down dramatically. In all probability, you don’t need all of these programs to automatically start when you boot your computer.

AutoRuns is a free utility, which has the most comprehensive knowledge of auto-starting locations of any startup monitor and shows you what programs are configured to run during system boot up or login, and shows you the entries in the order Windows processes them.

These programs include ones in your startup folder, Run, RunOnce, and other Registry keys. You can configure AutoRuns to show other locations, including Explorer shell extensions, toolbars, browser helper objects, Win logon notifications, auto-start services, and much more. AutoRuns goes considerably beyond the MSConfig utility bundled with Windows Me and XP.

Download: AutoRuns

Spyware and Malicious Programs

The most common complaint about spyware is it slows down the operating system. As spyware accumulates on a computer, performance can grind to a dismal halt. Combating spyware starts with learning to recognize its presence and understanding its impact on system resources.

Recognizing when spyware is installed on a computer system and removing it promptly is the best method of protecting computers from catastrophic problems caused by spyware. There are many free applications available to help you recognize, control and remove spyware, adware, Trojans, and other malicious malware/programs that can infect and slowdown your system.

Here are some free applications that are reliable and I feel confident in recommending.

SpyBot Search and Destroy

AdAware

AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition

ThreatFire 3

Comodo Firewall Pro

Share this post :

AbiWord – Free Multilingual Word Processor for Windows, Linux

Recently, I got a call from a friend who had saved his resume in Microsoft Word format, but who no longer had access to Microsoft Word. As a consequence, he could not update his resume. He wondered if, he could “borrow” my copy of Word to install on his computer so that he could revise his resume. It struck me that he, like many computer users, was unaware of the many free alternatives to Word that are available for download, most of which “save” and “open” in Word’s .doc format.

AbiWord is arguably the best of these in the class that I refer to as, light word processing applications. AbiWord has been designed to integrate perfectly with the operating system it runs on. It will take advantage of the functionality provided by the system, such as image loading, or printing capabilities.

As important, AbiWord is able to read and write all industry standard document types, such as OpenOffice documents, Microsoft Word documents, WordPerfect documents, Rich Text Format documents, HTML web pages and many more.

AbiWord has a quite small resource footprint, which allows full functionality on systems that are not considered “State of the Art”.

I find AbiWord with its surprising amount of features and simple straightforward interface, to be the appropriate word processor I need running in the background while I’m on the Internet. As stated earlier, its small memory footprint as opposed to memory hogging Microsoft Word, is ideal for most of my day to day work.

In fact, as you can see from the lead picture, this article was produced on AbiWord.

Quick facts:

• Multi Platform
• Internationalized
• Advanced document layout options
• Tables, bullets, lists, images, footnotes, endnotes and styles
• Available in most common, and many not-so-common languages
• Spell checker
• Dictionaries for over 30 languages
• Supports right-to-left, left-to-right, and mixed-mode text
• The above feature allows support for languages like Hebrew and Arabic
• Mail Merge capabilities

Download at: Abisource

Share this post :